This week I finally was feeling better so I got to bring Bant Astral Slide through a league. If you tuned in, you know how that went:
All in one turn…
I had the Reclamation Sage!
They had a Noxious Revival, another Omniscience and Ugin
Turn two kill from mono red painter
Turn three burn kill
Turn three cast emrakul is very good.
While the deck in testing has been fun we didn’t really get to show the true fun moments having played against three combo decks, burn and a Czech Pile deck that didn’t function.
This was the deck list that I ran to my modest 1-4 record
Bant Slide
While the run wasn’t great we really didn’t get to learn a lot because our opponents had extremely good hands or their deck didn’t function as pictured earlier. One of the very few things I learned is how much more efficient the deck is with Exploration and I may have to switch the Mox Diamonds in Junk Astral Slide for Exploration given how much the mana ramp seemed to help the deck function.
The main changes that I would make as of now are as follows:
Mainboard
-1 Mirari’s Wake
-1 Decree of Justice
Let’s face it, these were just fun includes that unfortunately never got to do anything due to the nature of our matches. Maybe some day we can include them again and have some good old fashioned Bant Slide fun.
+1 Council’s Judgment
+1 Armageddon
Council’s Judgment is great at answering anything that needed an answer.
Armageddon is the right level of mean that I’m looking for. If our opponent knows that I am trying to deny mana with Wasteland, Life from the Loam and Exploration then our Armageddon can snag any basics they may dig out. This will help against decks like Miracles and post board gives us the ability to board wipe against creature based strategies like Death and Taxes and Elves with The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale.
Sideboard
-4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
-1 Council’s Judgment that is now in the main.
-1 Dragonlord Dromoka
+2 Flusterstorm
+2 Sigarda, Host of Herons
+1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
+1 Karakas
Thalia is likely fine against fast combo and cantrip heavy decks but likely just doesn’t do enough outside of eating a removal spell while also slowing us down.
Dragonlord Dromoka is likely fine overall but is fairly slow against Burn and isn’t as hard to answer as Sigarda against other fair decks.
Flusterstorm allows us to fight over spells on the stack like Show and Tell and any number of the spells out of Storm such as Tendrils of Agony.
Sigarda is a very difficult threat to answer with Hexproof, five toughness and not allowing your opponent to force you to sacrifice via effects like Liliana of the Veil -2 and Diabolic Edict.
The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale is a great tool against creature strategies. On land light board it allows us to balance the board out and restrict our opponents resources while preventing our opponents from putting out enough pressure to close the game faster than we can stabilize the game.
Karakas is a great tool against Sneak and Show, Reanimater and Death and Taxes where legendary creatures can cause us fits. Another very strong reason for inclusion is Leovold which provides our opponent with a lot of card advantage when we have to use Astral Slide defensively. It also restricts our ability to cycle through our deck each turn between cycle lands, Brainstorm and Jace, the Mind Sculptor.
Here is the updated list if I had to run it back tomorrow:
Bant Slide
| Lands (28) 2 Forest 2 Island 2 Lonely Sandbar 4 Misty Rainforest 1 Plains 2 Savannah 2 Secluded Steppe 2 Tranquil Thicket 2 Tropical Island 2 Tundra 3 Wasteland 4 Windswept Heath Creatures (8) 4 Eternal Witness 3 Nimble Obstructionist 1 Sigarda, Host of Herons Spells (24) 3 Astral Slide 4 Brainstorm 3 Council’s Judgment 4 Exploration 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor 3 Life from the Loam 4 Swords to Plowshares | Sideboard (14) 2 Dragonlord Dromoka 2 Ethersworn Canonist 2 Flusterstorm 1 Karakas 3 Reclamation Sage 1 Sigarda, Host of Herons 3 Surgical Extraction |
While I would happily run this deck again, I would prefer to play against more fair decks and I will definitely continue to work on upgrades to improve the combo match up so I’m not so caught off guard next time.
Happy brewing to each and every one of you. If anyone has an idea for a brew that they would like to see, I will gladly take requests and challenges on twitter or in email at brewmesomespice@gmail.com.
Aaron Gazzaniga works part time at a game store and in his off time has been an avid magic player/brewer since 2003. Having begun in Odyssey Standard Block and always favoring control and prison style decks, we come to this moment in time where Aaron finally gets to talk about and share his ideas. If you want to contact Aaron tweet @aarongazzaniga